A disappointment Junna Tsukii after losing her gold medal match in the SEA Games 2023. –JUNE NAVARRO
PHNOM PENH—Junna Tsukii dropped her gold-medal match against Malaysia’s Chandran Shahmalarani in an encounter the reigning World Games champion felt she got the raw end of the deal on Saturday at the karate competitions of 32nd Southeast Asian Games.
“How can I lose. I’m sure that I had the advantage and I was more active than her. But they chose her, so I don’t know what happened with the judge,’’ said Tsukii after settling for a silver medal in the women’ -50kg kumite.
Shahmalarani got knocked down by Tsukii twice, but the Malaysian champion was able to level the count at 1-all before the fight got halted by the judges in favor of Shahmalarani.
“I’m not happy. It was a total disappointment. She was down, stepped back and I pressed on, but they gave it to her,’’ said Tsukii, who won the title in the World Games last year in Birmingham, Alabama.
Sakura Alforte, a Filipino-Japanese just like Tsukii, earlier claimed the first gold for the national karate team in the women’s individual kata.